51. It's no wonder evangelical atheists need to shout so loud

Comment #237964 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 1:13 pm

I can only take comfort that I don't know where Calgary is.

52. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237939 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 12:45 pm

"some posters" ... interesting!

53. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237932 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 12:31 pm

Sciros,

I thought you are into that teacher-student game. And so I started with my post (155. Comment #237859). I even called you Johnny!

Well, it turned out you are not and took my said post as an omni-reply to all your concerns. I can see why you get a little bit emotional at some point in your reply.

To make it clear, I'm not a practical cat, just someone who values principles first. Maybe it turns out my Rules 1-4 are just some impractical bullshit at the end.

To preempt you from assigning positions to me that are not actually mine, and hence saving me from responding to them, I would sincerely suggest you to run the following thought experiment: (1) Imagine you are a teacher that upholds the four rules that I promulgated in the last page. (2) See how far you can get.

Yours Truly

54. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237924 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 12:07 pm

Sciros,

My laptop got unplugged, and I have to retype everything again. It'd take awhile.

Meanwhile, I wanna point out that I never say "NOMA compromises the education of deist/atheist/agnostic students." This may be someone else's stance. (I saw a lots of "compromise" floating around in the last page.) I criticize Mr Campbell for bringing his personal belief (NOMA) into classroom. Surely, you are free to criticize me for doing just that!

----------------------

beeline,

It seems that we are talking thru each other. Let's NOMA ourselves on this issue.

55. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237886 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 11:28 am

SteveN and severalspeciesof,

I've a feeling that somehow "you can't prove a negative" has become a dogma of sort. I'd blame Bertrand Russell for that.

56. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237877 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 11:21 am

Sciros,

Only the first two quotes of your post (159. Comment #237865) are mine.

Personally, I'm okay to be critizised for what I said. I take that it's only a careless mistake?

57. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237873 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 11:12 am

Sciros,

I think I'm very clear by stating the premise:

"When the instructor is asked to affirm or deny the existence of God:"

I invite you to calm down, and maybe we can start anew?

58. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237868 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 11:04 am

beeline: "I don't think you can (1) disprove the existence of something claimed to exist. And I don't think you can (2) equate the meaninglessness of the claim as disproof either."

For (1), I invite you to reread the relevant post (118. Comment #237711). I think you missed "so defined" in your first perusal.

For (2), I simply did not do that. Please check the second possibility in (142. Comment #237814).

beeline: "Point 2 is exactly what NOMA addresses - you can't make any logical certainties around a 'meaningless claim'..."

It seems to me you misconstrue NOMA. But that's not my business any more...

59. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237860 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 10:28 am

beeline,

Apologies accepted.

60. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237859 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 10:22 am

Sciros,

When the instructor is asked to affirm or deny the existence of God:

If the instructor is in the classroom, he should point out that he is not supposed to allow his personal belief (or non-belief, for that matter) to interfere his teaching, and that he is willing to tell them his opinion and discuss all the relevant issues that his students are concerned with in a non-teaching setting, like after class. Emphasize that he will be honest to them by then, but in a classroom he should obey Rule 2. (By the way, I did criticize in an earlier post Mr Campbell for not doing so but sneaking in his belief (NOMA) into his class.)

In the after class setting, let's suppose you and your concerned family members are now in my office. So, what do you wanna know, Johnny? Which issues are bothering you?

-------------------------

Sciros: "Okay, you teach me false logic, I'll teach you grammar."

You have the right attitude already.

61. Plan to exhume cardinal is 'homophobic'

Comment #237845 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 9:17 am

Thank you, hungarianelephant! Bonzai, you can ignore me and deal with hungarianelephant instead.

62. Plan to exhume cardinal is 'homophobic'

Comment #237844 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 9:15 am

Bonzai,

I'm not trying to be semantic. I am trying to point out your "Being discriminated is the same as losing rights that everyone else enjoys." ignores the gay factor.

Let me try another way. There are no black rights. Decades ago, people simply fought for civil rights, for everyone, not just any minority.

63. Plan to exhume cardinal is 'homophobic'

Comment #237835 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 8:49 am

Bonzai,

Any difference?

1. Being discriminated is the same as losing rights that everyone else enjoys.

2. Being discriminated as gay is the same as losing gay rights that everyone else enjoys.

64. Plan to exhume cardinal is 'homophobic'

Comment #237832 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 8:42 am

Bonzai,

You miss the key: gay.

65. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237831 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 8:34 am

beeline,

"Sorry, I don't understand what you mean to communicate here. Obviously I see the difference."

Check (142. Comment #237814).

66. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237830 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 8:31 am

beeline,

"And I think you made some fairly rude accusations about me as well..."

What are you talking about? State them!

67. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237824 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 8:20 am

Sciros,

You seem to find it in certain circumstances to be difficult to be honest to your students (let's suppose you are a science teacher.) and, possibly, their families. You also seem to suggest "total intellectual "integrity" in this case trumps students' learning," not helps students' learning.

How about that. Let's play teacher-student game for a few posts. You student, I teacher?

Edited slightly, from "instead of helps" to "not helps."

68. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237814 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 8:02 am

SteveN,

The morale of Sagan's "Dragon" is, as I see it, when the existence of something is claimed, it is possible to:

1. disprove it.

or 2. apply pressure to the claimer to retreat to the stage where his "refined" claim becomes meaningless.

(These by no means exhaust all possibility.)

69. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237810 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 7:56 am

Rule 1. Honesty is the best policy.

Rule 2. Don't sneak in personal convictions, religious or not, into classroom. That includes creationism, NOMA, I-am-the-fastest-man-on-earthism, etc.

Rule 3. Encourage those who feel pressured and/or concerned that the course material cannot recounciled with their personal believes, religious or not, to come to talk to you after class. Be considerate. You can even invite the student's family to come along.

Rule 4. Teacher science professionally.

70. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237804 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 7:46 am

beeline,

You see the difference?

1. A fire-breathing dragon.

2. An invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire.

By the way, I'm still expecting you to edit your post (Comment #237162). I'm willing to reason with you. But I don't take unfound accusation.

71. Plan to exhume cardinal is 'homophobic'

Comment #237749 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 5:28 am

Bonzai,

Which position is better? Arguing against gay discrimination or arguing for gay rights?

72. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237711 by Smith on August 27, 2008 at 4:24 am

To whom it may concern:

On testing the existence of certain entity E.

We can start with collecting all the available testable alleged attributes of E. Let's call them A1, A2, ...

Now we can test the validity of A1. If it passes, we move on to test the validity of A2. If it fails, then E, so defined, does not exist. If, instead, one remove the attribute A1 from the list when its validity is falsified, then we are NOT talking about the same old E any more. It would be a new entity E' with attributes A2, A3, ...

In the special case where all Ai of E are removed, we can ask: what is E when it has no testable attribute at all?

---------

As an example, what follows is the first part of "A fire-breathing dragon lives in my garage" by Carl Sagan. Notice how the fire-breathing dragon "evolves" into "nothingness."

Suppose (I'm following a group therapy approach by the psychologist Richard Franklin) I seriously make such an assertion to you. Surely you'd want to check it out, see for yourself. There have been innumerable stories of dragons over the centuries, but no real evidence. What an opportunity!

"Show me," you say. I lead you to my garage. You look inside and see a ladder, empty paint cans, an old tricycle -- but no dragon.

"Where's the dragon?" you ask.

"Oh, she's right here," I reply, waving vaguely. "I neglected to mention that she's an invisible dragon."

You propose spreading flour on the floor of the garage to capture the dragon's footprints.

"Good idea," I say, "but this dragon floats in the air."

Then you'll use an infrared sensor to detect the invisible fire.

"Good idea, but the invisible fire is also heatless."

You'll spray-paint the dragon and make her visible.

"Good idea, but she's an incorporeal dragon and the paint won't stick." And so on. I counter every physical test you propose with a special explanation of why it won't work.

Now, what's the difference between an invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire and no dragon at all?

73. Porn pastor's wife vows to stand by him

Comment #237428 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 1:10 pm

JFHalsey,

Maybe even thief has principles sometimes.

74. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237421 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 12:57 pm

John Locke,

I don't mean to be mean to poor Mr Campbell. Actually, I can rephrase my criticism on him as a question: Should we allow a science teacher's personal believes, no matter how sincere, to be shared with his students (in a science class)?

Now, my point is if we are fuzzy about the introduction of creationism into science teaching, why do we give a pass to NOMA?

75. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237401 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 12:26 pm

Hi Sargeist,

It's always nice to hear someone say, "I do think you have a point."

I just posted my response to John Locke right before you did yours. Maybe that will help resolve our difference.

76. Channel 4 announces return of Undercover Mosque

Comment #237389 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 12:16 pm

I, on the other hand, thought "whiteness" is derogatory, as in "acting white."

77. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237382 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 12:10 pm

John Locke,

It's strange. You ignore my response to you (80. Comment #237152) and instead take the first part of my reply to Sargeist (96. Comment #237270) as a response to you but ignore the second part, which would direct you back to (80).

Anyway, in (80), I tried to point out that from the context of PZ Myers post, it is a stretch to conclude that Myers considers Mr Campbell as "chicken-hearted," since Myers knows that Mr Campbell is a theist.

Also, in (96), when I invite Sargeist to compare the two statements, I wanted to point out the usage of the word "that" is to single out the problematic position, NOMA, which is rightfully deserved to be described as "chicken-hearted."

To sum up, I don't know how Myers thinks. Maybe he indeed thinks Mr Campbell as chicken-hearted. But I can only make inference from the content and context of his post, which says otherwise.

Since you are being vague by using people in "i think people are just being a bit too defensive of myers," I can only say that if you think I'm one of them then you are wrong. I can't care less about him.

As an aside, I would like to know what you think about my criticism on Mr Campbell in (84. Comment #237158).

78. Porn pastor's wife vows to stand by him

Comment #237328 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 10:58 am

A tip for Pastor G: Redefine cancer and declare porn addiction (and whatever trivialities you are hiding) as cancer. Be sure to back you up with a passage of scripture or two.

79. Channel 4 announces return of Undercover Mosque

Comment #237313 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 10:44 am

Things might get less tacky if instead of using the lump-sum term IQ test we could be more specific and say: memory test, spacial recognition test, kun fo test, rap test, ...

80. Channel 4 announces return of Undercover Mosque

Comment #237299 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 10:30 am

J Mac,

Maybe, just maybe, historically IQ tests were designed for the "elite," hence the real or perceived bias.

81. Channel 4 announces return of Undercover Mosque

Comment #237292 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 10:16 am

al-rawandi,

"This pile of stuff was actually a great meal, depending on what you looked for. For instance in terms of nutrition it was excellent, but was pretty poor in taste.

by Anton Ego"

82. Channel 4 announces return of Undercover Mosque

Comment #237282 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 9:57 am

al-rawandi: "I think it is a little more advanced than "The Bell Curve"."

I'm listening to "The Demon-Haunted World" by our late prophet Carl Sagan. He claimed that the author(s) of "The Bell Curve" committed the typical "correlation is causation" error.

So, don't expect too much.

83. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237270 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 9:31 am

Sargeist,

Can you see the difference between the following two statements?

1. I despise that chicken-hearted answer.

2. I despise his chicken-hearted answer.

------------------------------
Edit: Also, please consider my reasoning in (80. Comment #237152). I tried to point out it is illogical for PZ Myers to consider Mr Campbell as "chicken-hearted." Of course, I can't rule out the possibility that PZ Myers is indeed "being illogical" in this instance.

84. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237201 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 7:36 am

padster1976,

That's strange! Don't he know that he's in another universe? Why don't he simply get a new account and come back stronger than ever? Why don't you just go "socialize" with him to get a better picture for us?

85. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237191 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 7:12 am

Please edit your post (Comment #237162), beeline. You are treating King of NH and me as a team and so attribute what he said and hence direct what your response to him to me, too.

When you are confused, the first thing you should do is clarify the matter or ask for a clarification, not speculate someone's intention.

To set an example for you: I am confused and don't know if the PZ-worship statement is directed to me. Would you please clarify?

By the way, it should not be that hard to send an email to PZ Myers.

86. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237158 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 5:19 am

It's very strange; no one seems to think or point out that it is unprofessional at least for the anglican Mr Campbell to sneak in his NOMA opinion to a science class.

He maybe honest with his NOMA position as a theist, but he is supposed to be a science teacher.

87. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #237152 by Smith on August 26, 2008 at 4:02 am

beeline, John Locke, and maybe bamafreethinker,

PZ Myers knows that Mr Campbell is a theist, and so understands (as we do, I suppose) that Mr Campbell should be very comfortable with the NOMA answer (to the "Is there a God?" question). So PZ Myers certainly knows that Mr Campbell's response is NOT out of being "chicken-hearted." Then why would he call him so?

88. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #236795 by Smith on August 25, 2008 at 10:31 am

bamafreethinker,

PZ Myers uses the two paragraphs you mentioned to suggest "two reasonable ways" to address the question, "Is there a God?" He is not "to tell us how Campbell (and the rest of school teachers) should be attacking religion directly with science", as you said.

89. A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

Comment #236776 by Smith on August 25, 2008 at 10:02 am

beeline,

PZ Myers wrote: "I despise that chicken-hearted answer."

It's the NOMA answer that Myers considers chicken-hearted.

90. A flea we missed?

Comment #232126 by Smith on August 17, 2008 at 4:15 pm

Speaking of Sam Harris and religion and science, I recently read (well, listen to) Bertrand Russell's "Religion and Science" and find that their points of view are quite similar, most remarkably on the issue of "spirituality".

91. A flea we missed?

Comment #232082 by Smith on August 17, 2008 at 3:10 pm

AP: "SharonMcT - That's probably true, but if people feel that strongly about it, then they should speak up."

Maybe Sharon doesn't want to be described as "shrill and strident".

92. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221151 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 11:42 am

So to sum up, you think that children are at the mercy of their parents?

93. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221139 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 11:25 am

Oh... my poor english.

twp, sorry for the ambiguity in 530. I meant to say the website which critizes The United States for being one of only two countries (Somalia is the other one) in the world that have not ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) may not be a reliable source b/c "I just google it".

btw, when you say:
"Children dont have "rights" as children. They have "rights" as human beings. ... Parent's have a right to raise their children however they see fit."
Aren't you favoring certain human beings' (parents') rights over others' (children')? Care to clarify?

I hope at least you would agree that when it comes to children, we should talk about parents' responsibilities first, instead of their (parents') rights.

94. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221128 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 11:08 am

No wonder Stalin is an atheist.

95. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221116 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 10:51 am

twp, sorry for the ambiguity in 530. I meant to say the source may not be reliable b/c "I just google it".

btw, when you say:
"Children dont have "rights" as children. They have "rights" as human beings. ... Parent's have a right to raise their children however they see fit."
Aren't you favoring certain human beings' rights over others'? Care to clarify?

96. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221075 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 10:16 am

twp:
"Parent's have a right to raise their children however they see fit. The only time the state needs to intervene is when the child's life is in danger or there is a serious health risk."

Don't you think there is a big grey area here that we should clear up with a set of (to-be-defined) laws for the better protection of the children?

97. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221071 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 10:10 am

twp,

I can't be sure it's reliable; I just google it:
http://www.hrw.org/children/us.htm

I suppose you are referring to children in general and not children in the US.

98. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #221048 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 9:48 am

How'bout starting with children's rights, instead of the parent's? What are they now? What should they be?

Usually, under a fairly good assumption that parents would love and care their children, we expect a child's rights would not be violated by its parents. But what can, and in what extent, the state do if the child's rights are indeed violated by its parents? It seems that the status quo is against the children in favor of their parents.

A case in point. What should the state do if a child is in critical medical situation, for instance, in need of a blood transfusion? Should we repect the parents' rights because the child "belongs to" them? Or should we protect the child's rights?

99. A third of Muslim students back killings

Comment #220986 by Smith on July 29, 2008 at 8:49 am

twp and al,

Are you assuming that children are their parent's property?

100. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #174629 by Smith on May 3, 2008 at 3:08 am

For your information, this week on Point of Inquiry, D. J. Grothe interviews Chris Hedges. Here is the link.

Copied from PoI: In this discussion with D.J. Grothe, acclaimed foreign correspondent Christ Hedges shares his criticism of the New Atheists, calling them "fundamentalists" in their own right. He responds to their account of the origins of Islamic religious extremism, and he accuses the New Atheists of racism. He explains his view that the New Atheists are proponents of the Neo-conservative agenda and how the American Left does advance secular values in the Muslim world. He also criticizes what he calls the "utopianism" of the New Atheists, detailing his skepticism about moral progress for humanity.